Restructuring :all LDC lecturers sacked
asked to reapply for jobs afresh
AL-MAHDI SSENKABIRWA
posted on 3,December ,2011
KAMPALA. The management committee of Law Development Center (LDC) has terminated services of all lecturers and asked them to reapply for the jobs in the on-going restructuring aimed at improving academic standards at the centre.
LDC Deputy Director, Ms Florence Nakachwa confirmed the changes saying the decision had been taken by the by the management committee.
“Yes it is true but contact the secretary (Joyce Werikhe) for the details,” Ms Nakachwa told this paper on Friday.
However, when contacted, Ms Werikhe said their decision had been misinterpreted as sacking by a section of the academic staff but they are simply regularizing their employment.
“It is not true, all we did is to give them options on whether they should be given permanent contracts or temporary contracts. We have not terminated any contract,” Ms Werikhe said in a telephone interview.
The Centre employees 40 full time lecturers , 30 part-timers and host of over 100 support staff. A source at the centre, which preferred anonymity to speak freely about the changes said management was effecting a human resource audit report which will change the employment regime from the traditional permanent and personable job to ‘flexible employment contractual arrangement’.
“In fact what they are trying to do is in the best interest of staff because they will be getting benefits annually unlike in the current arrangement .But of course since it requires re-submitting applications for one reason or the other, one can be rejected, ” the source said
According to the source, staff have up to the end of this month to submit their applications since the new system become operational in January.
The development comes hardly two months after the same committee declined to renew the contract of the director, Mr Elijah Wante, ending his nearly three -decade career at the helm of the centre's management. Mr Wante, whose job has already been advertised in the papers, is expected to handover office in March next year.
The centre is currently under spotlight over falling academic standards, partly blamed on absenteeism of lecturers, congestion and poor quality of students admitted for the Bar Course. Majority of the lawyers admitted at the Centre fail to complete the course in the record 11 months after failing exams which they re-sit, something graduating after four years .
The centre was designed to enroll 120 diploma and bar students, but currently has five-times the number.
Although the blame has been put on LDC lecturers for failing to bring the best out of the students, management instead accuses universities of sending them poor quality graduate lawyers.
Early last year, the centre on training all the 40 full time lecturers and 30 part-timers in a bid to curb the failure rates which have dogged the centre over the years.
Last year, LDC introduced a new policy that requires all lawyers joining LDC to do pre-entry exams, a measure meant to weed out sub-standard students.
LDC is the only institution in the country that admits law graduates to obtain diplomas in legal practice. A lawyer cannot practice as an advocate in Uganda without the diploma.
Over the years ,there have been calls to break the monopoly of LDC to offer the bar course but this move has faced stiff resistance from the Law Council which argues that opening up the market could compromise the standards.
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